


Cabin Fever

by TheWildHeffernan



Category: Gunsmoke
Genre: 1870s, Adventure, Gen, Hypothermia, Peril, Snowstorms, Western, crime I guess, depending on the angle, historical accuracy but only when it's fun (which is always), old time radio - Freeform, or 1950s
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-02-14
Packaged: 2021-02-19 12:22:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22710766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheWildHeffernan/pseuds/TheWildHeffernan
Summary: When Matt insists on following an escaped prisoner into a blizzard, even though he'll probably go free, he and Chester end up stranded. That's the least of their worries, though.It's gonna be a long storm.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2





	Cabin Fever

Willard was finally warm, and getting sleepy, when he thought he heard a horse. He'd have assumed it was his own. He was comfortable in the bed of straw he'd fashioned in the chimney corner, and he doubted very much whether he'd get up to check.

That's when the door slammed open. The wind was screaming like a dying thing, and the fire went nearly out as snow swept in around Willard's ankles, for you can bet he was standing now. He wasn't alarmed, any more than he'd been alarmed when first he'd been locked up, but he was certainly surprised. They were over thirty miles out from Dodge, in a stand of woods nobody had called theirs since probably before the war. The house, if you could call it that, once had two rooms and now had one, the other collapsed behind a door. It hadn't even a stove–just a hearth, with an enormous cast-iron crane somebody must have pried from their grandfather's inn back east someplace, even though George Washington was meant to have stayed there once.

Chester slammed the door.

"Well, fancy this," said Willard. "Good evening to you." The fire bloomed again, and Willard couldn't help but grin. The marshal's mustache was frozen white, along with everything else upon them both. Chester was glaring murder, hunched and shivering, and the marshal, curiously, wasn't doing much of anything. Willard only noticed when Chester let go that he'd had a hand on the marshal's coat, as if he'd hauled him in by the collar. Willard's grin ticked wider.

"He alright?" Willard asked.

"Yes."

"I'm only asking, Chester. He looks a little punchy to me. And the pair of you are just blushing like roses...why, have you men been drinking?

"Be quiet."

"It's no good to drink if you're gonna be out in this kind of weather."

"Be quiet and stay that way 'til we get back to Dodge and I can gag you with a iron bar."

"You hear that, Marshal?"

"I'd worry of my own self if I was you."

"I weren't talking to you, Chester."

"I don't like your voice, Willard," said Chester. "Those your provisions, there?"

"That's right."

Chester looked to the marshal, who still hadn't said a word. Dillon looked up to the ceiling.

"Will I make us something to eat?" said Chester.

"Yeah," said the marshal, after a second.

"You best set by the fire, Mr. Dillon."

"Oh my," said Willard, clicking his tongue regretfully. "Has the cold addled him?"

"I'll addle you in a minute."

"Sure, Chester, sure. Just like you done the last time." Chester had come in with his gun out, and Willard thought he looked awfully puny, drawing just to take a sorry shack like this one.

"Drop your gun, Willard."

"Sure."

"I said drop it!"

"Take it easy, take it easy! There."

"Now kick it o'er to me, please."

"Okay."

"Thank you." Chester stuck it in his belt and steered the marshal, who was walking sort of dizzy, over to the fire. "Fetch some water, will you, Willard? Don't worry about your horse or nothing. You'll be going out as you are."

"Without my coat, you mean?"

"Yes."

"Without my boots, even?"

"You won't be long gone, will ye?"

"...Reckon not."

"Well, go on."

"Aw, now–"

"Go on, I said."

"You sure did." Willard made his way slowly towards the hearth.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"I gotta have a bucket, don't I?"

Chester shrugged. Willard rolled his eyes and picked up the ancient stewpot. The marshal was sitting on a pinewood footstool, which was the only furniture on the place. Willard had never stood so close to him without being manhandled one way or another. The marshal wasn't even looking at him now, though. He was gazing into the fire, blinking over-long, and as Willard watched, his chin dropped to his chest once, then again. Like some old drunk. Willard brushed hard against him on his way by.

"You know," said Willard, "You put hot water on 'im you're liable to stop his heart, Mr. Jailer."

"The water's for my coffee."

" _Your_ coffee?"

"Yes." Chester flicked his gun at the door. Willard shrugged and went out.

**~*~**

"Chester?"

"What?" Chester crouched before him on the hearth.

"Where's Willard?"

"He's making hisself useful. I sent him to get some water. I'll make us some coffee. He's got some bacon and meal and all like that, too. It'll last us the storm if we don't feed him too good." Chester was still so cold it made his voice shake in his chest, like some traveling theater-actor giving King Richard. If he could have kissed the fire, he would have. The heat, on his back, was better than a kiss. It was enough to make him weak in the knees.

"We're not staying here," said the marshal.

"Let's ought to get your coat off, it's dripping wet."

"We're riding back tonight."

"Mr. Dillon…"

"I told you before." He wasn't shivering much, which seemed odd, because his lips were blue. Chester stared back, until the marshal blinked.

"Well...alright," he said, just as if he'd go along with it. "But we'll still need to warm up some before we do."

"I'm fine now."

"Mr. Dillon, you...don't look altogether well."

"Why wouldn't I be well?"

"The cold's kindly got to you, that's all. Hasn't it?"

"I'm not cold."

"Maybe not no more, but you sure gave me a turn just now."

"Well, if you're cold we can stay a few minutes."

"Alright, sir. Would you take your coat off, please?"

"Are you cold?" Chester stood up and started to unravel his shawl. It was stiff as wire.

"I could sure be warmer," Chester replied.

"I don't see how." He smiled suddenly, which was always a bit alarming–his teeth were both sharp and rotten–and Chester hoped fervently he wouldn't start laughing again. It had scared him half to death, waist-deep in snow on the prairie, when Mr. Dillon started laughing at the drifts. He'd just about knocked himself down laughing. "Where's Willard?" He asked again.

"He'll be back directly. I'll take care of him." Mr. Dillon finally set about unbuttoning his coat, but it was slow going. Chester couldn't feel his fingers, either, or he might have helped.

Chester, though, had not been struck frozen. He wondered why. Chester had only heard of it happening, heard that a body could get so cold their blood grew slow and made them drunk. He'd heard you could die that way, if you got stuck for very long. He'd have thought he'd be the one it'd happen to, though, out of the two of them, being particularly slow-blooded to begin with. Doc said that's why he took so long to feel his liquor. Mr. Dillon said it was because he was too busy looking for his next round to see he didn't need it, and Miss Kitty said it didn't matter. There was never any reason to say so, but Chester thought it was probably just that he'd gotten fat. When he was younger, he could get stone drunk practically for free. Anybody can if there's nothing to eat.

"Chester?"

"Yessir?" Mr. Dillon looked Chester in the face, smiling with his blackened teeth and his thawing mustache, and barked out laughing. Chester flinched in spite of himself. Mr. Dillon could be very loud when he wanted to, or, it turned out, when he was cold enough. "Forevermore," said Chester. "What's so funny, anyhow?" The door opened as he spoke, as catastrophically as ever, and Willard came in, shaking, with the cauldron packed with snow. Chester stood.

"I guess you are, Chester," Willard answered.

"Give that here," said Chester.

"Sure." The marshal doubled up and laughed harder and quieter. Chester hung the cauldron up and Willard stood a few steps distant to watch in some small amusement. "He been that way long?"

Chester glanced at him and didn't answer. He could sure look at you funny, Willard had to give him that. Chester had a harelip that never got fixed quite right, so he always looked like he was pulling a mild face. Willard knew that kind of scar, or else he'd figure Chester had some spunk, the way he looked crazy at strangers.

"Say, Chester," said Willard. "I always wondered, you got a hole in your mouth?"

"Of all the foolish…"

"I really am curious, I got a girl cousin's got a hole in her mouth. Her people took her to St. Louis to get her sewed. Come out good as new so far as to look at, but she talks like a chinaman. Who done mended you, huh, Chester? Your ma? With a sewing needle? Your auntie?" Chester stared. "They might have been one in the same, they say that's how these things happen, sometimes."

"You leave my mother outta this," said Chester, after a few seconds, and unwilling to leave the fire just yet he began to lay out the food in his mind. It hardly ever stormed like this for more than a few days at a time, he'd just have to ration it. Even if they'd had nothing, nobody could starve in a few days, even if they felt like it. That's what Doc always told him, as if Chester didn't know it to be true.

Mr. Dillon got to coughing from laughing, and from there got to be quiet. Chester rung out all the clothing he could respectably remove, and started to pick the debris out of the water before it got too hot. Willard didn't seem sure what to do with himself, and Chester wasn't about to give him any hints. He wished he might have the decency to look put-out about all this.

"Chester?" said the marshal.

"Yessir?" Chester tossed a piece of gravel in Willard's direction.

"I'm going to bed."

"Y'are?"

"Turn the light out before you leave. You don't need anything." Chester wasn't sure if that was a question, but there were no lights. With that, Mr. Dillon got abruptly down from the stool and curled up on the floor, with his back to the fire.

"Wait a minute, Mr. Dillon. You got to get out of all them wet things."

"Yeah, listen to mammy, marshal," said Willard.

"Oh, shut _up_ , Willard." Willard stuck a piece of straw in his mouth and sat against the wall. Chester shook the marshal by the shoulder, then hauled him up to sit. The marshal grumbled.

"It'll just be a minute, Mr. Dillon. You'll be warmer this way, besides you go to sleep wet, why, you wake up with a sore ear. Everybody knows that." By the time Chester had said as much, he'd already taken the marshal's hat and scarf and was briskly unbuttoning his coat. "Kick off your boots, now." Chester jerked his coat out from under him. "That's it." The marshal got one of his boots off, and Chester got the other. "Alright. Goodnight, Mr. Dillon."

"Yeah, yeah," said the marshal, and curled up again. Willard could tell he was asleep by the time Chester had laid the things out to dry.

"You're mighty elegant undressing a man," said Willard.

"None of it ain't your business. I don't see you helping."

"Help?" Willard chuckled incredulously. "What do you need help with, I'll help."

"That's enough out of you."

"Alright, alright." Willard stretched out in the straw. "Reckon I'll get some sleep myself, then. Prisoners' privilege. It's not so bad on the floor here. Not so bad a t'all."

"Oh…" Willard closed his eyes and smiled serenely. "I'll have you know I got three kid brothers and one what's off in the head," Chester said, in a tone which implied Willard was being somehow _shown_.

"What?"

"Nevermind."

"Are you talking to me?"

"Nevermind, I said. Go to sleep a'fore I kick you dark."

"Sure, Chester, sure. Goodnight, now."

**~*~**

It was daylight when Willard woke up, in its own way. You couldn't see a thing out the window but white–if you looked long enough you could see the layers in it, the surge of its sheets like falling water, but that was all. Willard sat up slowly. Not a straw rustled. He saw the marshal was still asleep by the fire, breathing loud and heedless, his mouth just open and his hair dried to rust-red spines. There was a smell of wet wool, and wet ash. Chester was nowhere to be seen.

As softly as he could, Willard got to his feet. The wind was noisy and bright, and when he rode away it would be like morning on Thanksgiving, all sharp and swirling splendor. His coat was by the door, and his flint was in the pocket. What need did he have of his gun, if he could only get free of this prairie? If he could find a real town, with towns around it? If he didn't die in ecstasy in the blizzard, then he swore he'd never shoot again.

Chester opened the door. Willard sat back down.

"Oh. Hello, Willard," said Chester.

"Chester." Chester dropped an armful of wood by the fireplace.

"I took care of the horses."

"Bitch of mine wouldn't even make good glue," said Willard glumly. She'd made it all the way to this glade and lay down with him still on her. It was all he could do to wrestle her into the barn.

"That mare you stole?"

"I didn't steal her." He'd rented her. It wasn't robbery until Friday, and by Friday he'd be out of the country, wouldn't he. Wouldn't he.

"Well. I tell you what, that beast is mighty gentle to carry the likes of you. Not bad looking, neither."

"You like her so well why don't you marry her?" Chester gazed inscrutably his way for a moment and spit. The juice fell short an inch, and speckled the hem of Willards trousers. "Stop that."

"Keep your britches on. Could be it ain't even tobacco. Could be I just thought ye might like some coffee."

"Coffee, huh."

"Sure."

"Aw, marshal, ain't you awake yet?"

"Why don't you taste it and see?" Chester shifted whatever he was chewing to the other side of his mouth and smiled. "Open wide."

"Hey, marshal!" Willard started banging on the floor.

"You leave him lay–"

"I'm a citizen, I got a right to protection–"

"Willard, I shoulda hog-tied you right-off!"

"Hog-tie me nothing, I ain't even been tried!"

"Ye pink-eyed all-cursed fat dutch cur, I needn't the leave of no judge in the world to tie you end-to-end, don't think I won't–"

 _"Would the two of you shut up?"_ shouted the marshal. Willard turned to look at him, but Chester didn't. He stayed glaring Willard's way.

"Morning, Mr. Dillon," Chester said, after a moment.

"Yeah," said the marshal. He sat up and scrubbed his hands over his face.

"Going better with you, are they?"

"It's all relative."

"You been asleep a long while."

"Yeah, I can tell."

"You hungry?"

"No. Not now. You should eat, though. And feed Willard." Willard yawned; the marshal never even looked at him.

"If you say so, sir."

"I'm gonna lay down some more. I expect we'll move out in the evening."

"Oh. Okay, sir," said Chester, after a second. The marshal looked at him blearily.

"He ain't slept a wink, marshal," Willard said, in a piteous whine. Chester blinked.

"Why, you–"

"Okay! Okay. Chester, I'm sorry, I hadn't thought about it. You get some sleep after breakfast, and we'll go when you wake up. Willard, if I were you I wouldn't push my luck. Now. I'm gonna lay down."

"Alright, sir."

"Alright." The marshal got gingerly to his feet, went over to the hay, and kept his word. Chester drew a knife from his boot and started chipping away at Willard's bacon.

**~*~**

Matt's eyes were already open when he came awake. He hardly noticed at first, for it was dark.

He threw himself onto his hands and knees with a heavy grunt. Matt was never any good at rousing, and when there was no bed you didn't even have gravity on your side.

"Chester!" he bellowed.

"Here, sir."

"You were supposed to wake me!"

"Oh, well, you never said."

"I told you you ought've shifted him," said Willard.

Matt had never cared for Willard, even before he'd first got into trouble. He was peaceful enough even after, by most definitions, but he liked to get a rise out of people. Especially the younger girls. He was a tow-haired Swede or Dutchman or something like that, with thick yellow eyelashes. He was about as big as Matt but he moved quiet, like a thief, and he was always smiling. He had an irritating smile. He was fit all over the rest of him, but there was something doughy, or maybe rancid, about his smile.

"Howdy, marshal," he said. Matt didn't bother with him.

"The storm still going, is that it?"

"Yessir, 'tis," said Chester. "I figured we was still to leave, though. Lost trail of the time, I guess."

"Yeah," said Matt, dubiously. Chester was smoking a cigarette, lounging against the fireplace. His hair was matted wild. Matt shook his head. "You save any food, at least?"

"'Course I have. Hold on."

"Ain't I gonna get nothing?" said Willard.

"I done tol' you, you stay shut up a hour and I'll het it up special."

"Look, you give it to me now I'll go to sleep peaceful as a dove. You don't I'll talk all night if I starve."

"Chester."

"Yessir?" Chester handed Matt a dish of grits and bacon, without looking him in the face. It wasn't a lot. "Oh, he was being a bitchpot."

"Give him some food, Chester."

"Well,"

"Give him some food. It's the same as if he was in jail."

"It's regulation, would you say?"

"Yes, I would say."

"Well, Willard, it's your lucky night. Hope you'll find it comfortable here. In custody."

"What do I care? I already had to watch you eat, come on!"

"Steady, Willard," said Matt. Willard rolled his eyes.

Matt was starving, and by the time Willard had his, he'd finished.

"It may be free but it sure ain't much," said Chester. Matt shrugged. His skull was starting to throb again. The last time he'd been up he'd been woozy, and tired enough to shake with it, but now it was only a cold, dull pain in his head, far forward, like he'd gone to bed thirsty. He tried pinching the bridge of his nose.

"I've got some a' Doc's powders if you still got a headache." Chester had settled down to his perch again, and stared at Matt through his smoke. It wasn't like him to begrudge even a murderer his supper. But Chester would calm down once he wasn't trying to watch his own back. Willard would probably always be a bitchpot.

"No, that's alright. You got another cigarette?"

"Sure."

"No," said Matt–Willard had a speaking kind of look.

**~*~**

Willard danced from foot to bare foot in the barn and counted the doses. Down beneath the bandages, he'd found a handful, seven in all. If it was one for a headache and three for a fever, surely seven would set a man to sleep, but it didn't seem likely it'd be enough for two. He rummaged around some more. It was to be midday soon, and after they ate they were meant to pack and ride, only maybe Chester would complain, and they'd hang around awhile longer. It was true he'd hardly slept. Maybe that would help it work. If they only had some corn, that would do it better. Willard went to the other saddle.

His hand fixed on a bottle, and he brought it out to look. It was either morphine or iodine or laudanum. He sniffed it, and realized he didn't know what iodine smelled like.

He'd been gone too long. He stuffed all of it into his trousers and trudged back to the house. The snow was falling straight down now. Without the wind you could hear it hiss. It was the same noise a pine log makes when it's new and you put it on anyway. When Willard got free, he was going back to Minnesota. His brother would give him a job, and his brothers' wife would let him stay at least a little while. He knew she liked him. She didn't know it, but she might be taught, in time.

"Thanks, Willard," said Chester, and took the cauldron from him. "Hope you're ready to eat good, I'm fixing all the rest we got."

"All of it?"

"Sure. You'll be snug in jail by tonight, you won't need it then."

"I guess so."

"Hey, it's a sight cozier'n this place."

"Yeah."

"Oh, no need to get pettish. You ain't gonna hang."

"I ain't?"

"Not unless you really done it. And they can prove it."

"I ain't."

"Well. Like I say, they got to prove it. More likely you'll get packed up to Leavenworth."

"What happened to the marshal?"

"He been out to check the river's still well-enough froze. He'll be back. Soften that, will ye please?" Chester heaved a block of lard his way. Willard swept clean a space and slammed it to the floor.

"You're mighty friendly all of a sudden, Mr. Jailer."

"Well, it's naught to do with you. I'm just glad to be shed of this place, and of your face like it is. Whimpering."

" _I_ ain't never heard me whimper."

"It's your face that's whimpering. Just to look at it."

"You sure-enough crazy, Chester, or you just play that way?"

"I ain't crazy any way. Soften my lard or I'll soften your head."

"Yes _sir_."

"That's more like it." Chester turned away, mixing meal and syrup. Willard held his breath and made a dent with his elbow. He got six of the packets in before Chester glanced back. "Hurry it along, now, them cakes is waiting."

"I'm doing it, I'm doing it." Willard broke the last one, for any difference it would make, and started kneading in earnest. He _was_ doing it. Now, providing it didn't make it taste funny and the heat didn't ruin it and they ate it all and he'd put in enough, he was home free.

"Be back directly," said Chester, shrugging on his coat.

"Where're you going?"

"That's personal."

"You could piss out the door like a regular man."

"Don' be vulgar." He went out with his gun belt and Willard's boots under his arm.

Willard counted to ten, then went to the coffeepot. He poured in as much as he dared of the laudanum, or whatever it was, and tasted it. It just struck him like strong coffee. He added a drop more. And a little–

He shoved it into the ashes. His thumb blistered, but when he turned around Chester was just looking at the door as he closed it.

"Can I have some coffee? That's the last there is," Willard asked.

"Don't see what you'd need it for. Sleeping day in day out."

"I just like the taste," said Willard.

"Well. Here." Chester poured him half a cup. "You best enjoy it. That's all there is."

**~*~**

"What did you do to the coffee?" asked Matt.

"Oh, they ain't nothing the matter with it, no eggshells is all."

"Maybe it went moldy a'fore it was boiled," said Willard.

"It did not!"

"I think it did," said Matt.

"Well for pity's sake, you don't like it I'll drink it. Ingrate."

"Go ahead." Chester huffed and said something under his breath. "Say, maybe you oughta sleep some before we go."

"Mr. Dillon. Next I'll sleep it'll be in my own bed."

"Suit yourself. You'd better finish your food, though, you'll bite Willard's head off before we get there otherwise."

"You don't be careful I'll get yours first."

"... _Okay?_ "

"Sorry." Chester went back to his dinner. The marshal took another sip, grimaced, and poured the end of his coffee into Chester's cup. He was already done; the marshal ate fast even for a big man. Willard thought he looked a little glassy. He couldn't tell if Chester was acting funny, or if he was looking too hard.

"Wherefore ain't you et, Willard?" asked Chester. "You get picky too, all of a sudden?"

"I ate my meat, a man needs meat. Don't need the rest of it."

"You sure look like you started on that recent."

"He's right," said the marshal.

"I don't believe it."

"No? Look at the Indians."

"What about them?"

"You ever see a flabby renegade?"

"Well…"

Willard wondered exactly how it would happen. He supposed they wouldn't just fall down all of a sudden. Maybe they'd get to feeling merry. Maybe they'd get real drunk. But then they'd know he'd done it.

Willard's mouth went dry. He hadn't thought of it. How had he not thought of it? The marshal would shoot him. Well, he'd probably just try and tie him up or something, but if he ran or fought or if it wasn't laudanum after all but oil solvent and he'd killed Chester on accident, then the marshal would shoot him. Even if it was etching acid the marshal would last long enough to get him for it, even bleeding stomach to mouth, it'd only take a second–and even if it was just like Willard thought and it was only medicine, Chester wasn't very big–

"Willard?" said Dillon, flatly. "You alright? You look peaked." It seemed like such a good idea at the time.

"I...I feel sorta funny," said Willard.

" _Funny?_ "

"Like...dizzy, sorta. I think I might be sick."

"Well, don't be sick in here," said Chester.

"I...I really do, marshal…" Willard made what he hoped was a concerning noise. The marshal didn't look impressed. Chester stared in disgust and kept chewing.

"Alright. Come on, then," said the marshal.

Willard and the marshal stepped out into the snow, falling gently now, and Willard crouched and retched. When he thought strong enough about the marshal's gun, he was even able to get something up.

"Could I have got poisoned off the food? Off the bacon, maybe?" he asked.

"You could've, I guess."

"Oh, dear…"

"Yeah." The marshal huffed in irritation, but it wasn't at Willard, at least Willard didn't think so. He was looking at the sun through the cloud cover, as it crept towards mid-afternoon. "Are you finished?"

"I think so."

"Okay. If it happens again, tell Chester or me before you go, or we'll get nervous."

"Alright, I will."

"Okay."

"Is it alright if I stand here a while?" The marshal raised his eyebrows. "What? I ain't got my coat or nothing, I'm sick, I ain't going no place. I just don't wanna smell the cooking."

"Fine." The marshal settled to lean against the house. Presently he started to whistle. Once Willard lost feeling in his feet, he said,

"Alright, I'm ready."

"Good."

"Thanks, marshal."

"Yeah."

**~*~**

Chester was sitting cross-legged like they'd left him, with his plate on his lap, but seemed to have wound down. He was staring dully into the scraps of his dinner, with his hands curled limp upon his knees.

"Chester?" Chester looked up. When he moved his mouth it didn't make a sound, and he cleared his throat slow, like an opium smoker. Willard could hardly believe it, but something must have worked. "Are you okay?" Chester swallowed.

"I reckon I ain't but a bit over all of it," he said.

"What?" said the marshal. "Get over in the corner and stay there," he told Willard. "If you're sick, get sick." Willard went and crouched and watched. The marshal took Chester's knife and plate from him, and Chester stared straight ahead, mouth tense and parted, like a nervous dog. The marshal rolled his eyes. "You needn't look like all that, you know," he said. "It's just food poisoning."

"Mr. Dillon?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm seeing things."

"What?"

"I'm _seeing_ things."

"Like what–" Matt blinked and steadied himself against the mantle. He couldn't think of what to do with the plate and things now he had them. He tossed them towards the other stuff from the cooking. The clatter sounded far away to him, but Chester and Willard both jumped. "Like what kinds of things?"

"Black, like, I'm seein' black?"

"Easy."

"I see like there's something out the corner just laying to wait, what's gonna–what's got–"

"You probably just need to be sick."

"I don't–I– _oh_ , it ain't right, I ain't right."

"No, you ate something bad."

"I ain't...I dearly...purely..."

"Go outside a minute."

"Will you come?"

Matt shook his head hard and coughed. His mouth had gone bone dry.

" _Yeah,_ I'll come."

"Don't you look, Willard," said Chester. "Don't...oh."

"I ain't," said Willard. "Don't worry." He looked frightened.

"I wish you was dead," Chester informed him.

"Go outside," said Matt. "Willard, you move and you'll regret it. C'mon, Chester."

Chester raised a slow, deliberate finger to point to Willard's chest.

"I wish you was dead."

"Chester."

He got his feet flat on the floor and froze.

"Mr. Dillon?" he whispered.

"What?"

Chester shook his head and coughed sort of funny. Matt pulled him up under the arms and shoved him towards the door.

**~*~**

Chester sat in the snow and panted. Matt's head was swimming. He felt drunk, over-drunk, like he only ever got for dentistry's sake and even then, considering the alternative, he hated it. His eyes weren't clearing well. He was warm, though, or else it wasn't cold out anymore.

"I can't see," said Chester. "I can't see."

"You'll be fine," said Matt. "Listen. Take a deep breath. Hold it."

"Okay."

"Let it out slow. Like you're blowing through a reed. Now, you aren't sick at all. You...had a headache, and Doc gave you more medicine that he meant to, that's all."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. So you may as well enjoy it."

"Oh." Chester settled abruptly. Matt ate a few mouthfuls of snow, which helped. Chester was quiet for minute before he said, "Doc ain't here."

"Don't worry about it."

"Alright."

"Can you see, now?"

"A...a little. Yeah."

"You cold?"

"No."

"Good. You scared?"

"No, sir."

"Good." Matt almost sat down, too, but that would mean standing up again. The trees were so dark around them, and so close.

"I could live here," said Chester. "I don't wanna live here!"

"Well," said Matt. "You don't have to."

"But I could." He was making the face Matt guessed somebody had seen before they first carved those masks they put on theaters, the unhappy ones of those. He wasn't crying, just holding his face like he was.

"I'm gonna look at your eyes."

"What?"

"I said...don't move, I'm gonna look at your eyes."

Matt leaned against the cabin and bent low. Chester sat dutifully frozen, but for an almost imperceptible quake forward to back, forward to back. It wasn't ever good, was it, when people went forward to back.

"Stop that," he said. Chester didn't stop, but Matt wasn't sure he'd said it out loud. "Look at me." Chester looked at him and said,

"If I had to I guess…"

"Yeah," said Matt. The apples of Chester's eyes were the size of gnats. "That's not good. What are mine like, huh?"

"I could live most anywhere if I really had to. Don't want to but I only…" He trailed off and lay his head in his arms. Matt determined to kick him in case he was asleep but he was rocking to and fro in earnest, now, so he couldn't be completely, but that made Matt want to kick him all the same, because there was something wrong with him, and that made Matt feel like there was something wrong with himself. Which there was. Matt felt fine but his eyes weren't working right and he might fall down, he knew it. He took a deep breath.

"What do you like to do, Chester, when you're doped up for something?" Chester stopped rocking and talked into his arms. "I can't hear you." Chester turned his head to the side, and he looked more dreamy than scared.

"What?" he whispered.

"What do you like to do when you're all doped up. What's a nice thing to do."

"Well...I don't know. Listen to the piano?"

"Think about that."

"Mr. Dillon…"

"You know _Wildwood Flower?_ "

"Sure."

"Think about it, try and hear it in your head. Just do as I say." Chester leaned his head back and moved his lips. The ground tilted, and Matt stumbled. "Let's go in. _Chester._ "

"What?"

"Let's go inside."

"Okay. Can I...well."

"What?"

"I'm afright is all. I got brain fever."

"You don't. You're fine. You just took some medicine."

"Cussed..." said Chester dispassionately, and his eyelids fluttered. "Oh my gracious."

"Chester, look." Chester opened his eyes properly. "If something was wrong, I'd take care of it."

"Yessir," said Chester.

"But it isn't."

"Yessir." Chester sniffed. "You gone, too?"

"Just a bit. Not so far as you."

"Oh, no…"

"It'll be fine. We're fine."

" _Oh, no_."

"I should've been watching him too."

"I can't see."

"Well." Matt rolled his eyes. "That's fine."

"I'm gonna die."

"You're not gonna die."

"I already have done."

"No."

"Yeah."

"No." Nausea hit Matt rudely, all of a sudden. "No."

"No," Chester repeated.

"No. No, we're alright. It's–mm–" Matt bent double and vomited. Chester covered his ears.

**~*~**

The marshal shoved Chester in ahead of him and stamped in without shutting the door. Chester went behind Willard someplace, and it never occurred to him to look around. He held his breath and watched the marshal all the way to the straw, where he sat and sighed firmly, like he was trying to keep his dinner down. He drew his gun and rested it unobtrusively on his knee.

"You poisoned us, Willard," he said.

"I ain't," Willard said softly. "I'm sick as you."

"Don't bother lying about it. You put morphine in the coffee, is that it?"

"No."

"No, well. I guess I can't argue with that." He cocked his gun.

"Please," said Willard. He tried again to yell, but he couldn't. "Please. I ain't done nothing. I wanna go to trial and prove it, I wanna prove I ain't so bad. Don't kill me. Please."

"Don't shoot him," Chester said, in a corpsey sort of way."How're we ever gonna bury him?" Marshal Dillon's face was dim to the side of the fire and his freckles made it look dirty.

"Please," Willard whispered.

"I'm not gonna shoot you unless you try to...try to leave."

"I won't."

"You sure won't."

Chester took a deep breath. It took him a long time to fill his chest–not even all the way, just enough his lungs weren't hungry. The marshal shook his head and blinked. Willard sat still as could be.

**~*~**

The marshal didn't lay down, so he ended up passed out still sitting with his hand on his gun, head hung down almost to his lap. It made him breathe in fits and puffs, like an old man. It wasn't a way a person would sleep, which made Willard uneasy to watch it.

He sat still a half hour before creeping forward. The winter twilight was coming, any minute–vibrant, brief, and early.

Willard didn't bother going for his gun. He wrapped up what was left of the corn cakes, and then remembered about the matter with them–but if he had one in a day, he'd be alright, and it was probably the coffee that got then, anyhow. There were only scraps of meat and lard, but he took them anyway. He stuck the knife from the cooking in his belt. His boots were cold, but dry. He found his money and his flint where he'd left them in his coat, and a candle, too. He lit it off the embers and bundled up neatly by it. He'd go north, on the marshal's horse. He was branded, Willard would have to dump him soon enough, but he looked fast. He'd ride, he supposed, until the thing gave out from under him, and see how far that got him.

It seemed like pushing his luck to steal the saddle, too. But that was alright, there was nothing the matter with Willard's own saddle. He smoothed down his front and made his way carefully to the door.

Chester lay on his back, he saw, still as death but breathing easy enough. The fire was dying.

Willard hesitated a long time before he crawled out weightlessly over the floor, leaving his feet where they'd been and stretching out onto his belly. He held his breath and lowered the flame towards Chester's chin, and shrunk him in the candlelight to a set of teeth, shining like pearls in dirty water. Amongst them was a gap down into the bone, and behind that was a black hole. Willard wondered what would happen if you plugged it. Nothing, probably. It was never meant to be there in the first place. He plunged its depth with a piece of straw. Chester never so much as twitched.

Willard walked his hands back to his feet and stood. The door, on leather hinges, wasn't capable of creaking as he closed it on them, and the afternoon was frozen still. The snow was to his waist, but it was beautiful, and there wasn't a breath of wind to disturb it. The moon hung waxing in the daylight. Willard whistled long and low, for he didn't dare whoop. He was solid gone.


End file.
